Page:The open Polar Sea- a narrative of a voyage of discovery towards the North pole, in the schooner "United States" (IA openpolarseanarr1867haye).pdf/132

 corps. Between him and the executive officer there sprung up quite a rivalry of interest. While the one desired a clean ship moored in safety and a well-fed crew, he was naturally jealous of any detail of men for the other; and it must be owned that the men worked with much greater alacrity for the follower of Epicurus than the disciple of Copernicus. An appeal to head-quarters, however, speedily settled the question as to where the work was most needed; and, by a judicious discrimination as to what was due to science and what to personal convenience, we managed, while the daylight lasted, to lay the foundation of a very clever series of observations, while at the same time our comfort was secured.

A neat little observatory was erected on the lower terrace, not far from the store-house, and it was promptly put to use; and an accurate survey of the harbor and bay, with soundings, was made as soon as the ice was strong enough to bear our weight. The observatory was a frame structure eight feet square and seven high, covered first with canvas and then with snow, and was lined throughout with bear and reindeer skins. In it our fine pendulum apparatus was first mounted, and Sonntag and Radcliffe were engaged for nearly a month in counting its vibrations. It was found to work admirably. Upon removing this instrument, the magnetometer was substituted in its place, upon a pedestal which was not less simple than original. It was made of two headless kegs, placed end to end upon the solid rock beneath the floor, and the cylinder thus formed was filled with the only materials upon which the frost had not laid hold, namely, beans. Water being poured over these, we had soon, at ten degrees below zero, a neat and perfectly solid